Health Stories

August 15, 2011 7:06:03 AM EDTLucky - Health

Every time I used my pop's wave-ski, I never used the belt, but this one time I did because the water was particularly choppy that day. One wave was so big that it knocked me and the wave-ski upside down and I was face down in the water. Because I had the weight of the wave-ski on top of me, I couldn't for the life of me unlock the belt to set me free. I struggled very much so trying to keep my head above the water as my back was in a very twisted position due to being stuck on the other side of the wave-ski. I started calling out for help but no one around could see or hear me. I furiously paddling in deep water, then suddenly I came across a sand bank that I was previously unaware of. I stood up and freed myself. I was still a long way from the actual shore.

I was on a 900 mile drive for business. It was sleeting, and I was having trouble driving in it with my jeep, so I slowed down a bit. A semi was speeding in the sleet and rear-ended me straight on. My insurance went up, the cops were jerks, but all I could say was, "How on earth did I live through that? God only knows." So I answered my own question. I was so glad to be home I kissed the ground! On a bad day, I just remember how lucky I was to survive being hit by a speeding vehicle 100 times the size of mine.

I used to wrestle during all four years of high school. Back then, my friends and family all used to come and watch us play. One night, in the middle of my match, I was rolled over in an awkward way and compressed my neck. I immediately lost all feeling and movement from the neck down. I didn't really comprehend how serious it was until I was carted out in an ambulance. It slowly began to sink in that I might never be able to move again. And then all of a sudden, like somebody flipping on a lightswitch, the feeling came back to me. I feel lucky every day thinking about that.

The first (and last) time I ever played paintball, I got shot at close range in my balls. I don't remember anything except dropping down and waking up in a hospital, to have a doctor explain to me that a paintball ruptured one of my testicles, and I had to get it removed.

This story is a product of my own stupidity but a lucky one nonetheless. When I was a kid we used to hang out at the train station and put all sorts of shit on the tracks to see what would happen. Branches, lighters, coins. One day I put a penny on the track, like I had done a hundred times before, and waited for the train. Well when the train hit it, it must have caught the edge or something and it launched the penny like a bullet at my face. I felt the wind from it right past my ear. If it had been only a few inches over, I would have been fucked.

I was excited to kick off the summer with a weekend by the beach, but when I got there I noticed the police had closed it off with signs saying that swimming and digging were strictly prohibited. Apparently a recent storm had unearthed loads of unexploded World War II mines that had been buried all this time. I guess I'm lucky they never exploded before.

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